Focusing is a skill that not many people are able to control. There are so many different mental disorders that shows us that our brains have a mind of their own and when they are not willing to focus for long periods of time, they will not.
Researchers have been trying for a very long time to find a way to use headphones to help train the brain to focus better but, does it really work?
Kickstarter launched a set of headphones called Mindset. These headphones look exactly like your normal pair of headphones. They are comfortable, over the ear headphones that are noise cancelling and wireless. You can use some of the best headphones to listen to music as normal.
The biggest difference with these headphones is the fact that they have 5 electrodes which you cannot feel. The electrodes then begins to start measuring your brain waves.
We all know that these headphones work as follows: you put the headphones on and on your app and then you click start a work session.
We all know that our brain waves look different when it comes to us concentrating or when we are drifting away from work and towards the weekend.
The headphones pick up on the different brain waves and when the technology recognizes that you are drifting, it will play a certain tone. When you hear the tone, you will realize that your focus has drifted and you can refocus on the work at hand.
The aim of this technological breakthrough is that over time, you will begin to notice that your brain is not focused. This will in time retrain your brain to be focused more often and you will notice that you will begin to get distracted a lot less.
You will also begin to notice that you will have a pattern as to when you focus the most. This will help you become more productive and schedule your work around the times when you are more focused as opposed to trying to work through your hours of distraction.
Mindset has a great idea and they base these headphones on a science known as Neurofeedback.
Neurofeedback is the idea that you see real-time data of your brain’s activity and then use that data to train your brain to become better at something. In other words, seeing a physical representation of your concentration levels, will trick your brain into concentrating more and paying more attention.
Unfortunately, there is very little data that proves that neurofeedback can really improve your attention. A professor in California has said that the concept of neaurofeedback has been around for decades however, the data and results have been mixed.
They have tried to use this concept to help people who suffer from ADHD. We are also not aware of how accurate the electrodes of the Mindset headphones were so the overall outcome can, in fact, be a placebo effect on your body.
Regardless if the results are in fact in our minds or if the results have scientific results behind it, Mindset headphones have had a lot of positive reviews form people who use them on a daily basis.
Noise canceling headphones can help you concentrate on your work instead of concentrating on the noises and distractions around you. This does not mean that the headphones are going to train your brain to focus better but instead help get rid of a few distractions around you and thus improving your concentration levels.
Headphones in general at the moment have not been scientifically proven to help train you to focus better however, they are able to help you keep your concentration levels up for a longer period of time. These Mindset headphones are proving to be successful despite the fact that there is not enough data to back it up just yet.
If you would like to focus better and help train your brain, I would strongly suggest meditation. Meditation helps your body, mind and soul become one and you learn to train your brain to focus on a certain subject for a period of time.
This is one of the main ways in which you can train yourself to focus better.
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